Cinemania

District 9

2009-10-06T17:13:00.005+02:00

I have not been writing for a very long time now and have been waiting for a movie that pushes me to do so again; District 9 is the movie that triggered me again. Hereunder is my small commentary followed by a lengthy post from Telegraph UK.

District 9 is not for a squeamish. A political science fiction allegory that depicts the ugly truth of political activities and brings the hypocrisy, deceit and dirty manipulations of the media controlled by the powers to the light of skepticism of inquisitive minds to unravel the truth.

Telegraph UK's Review:

"Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 proves that science fiction can tell us as much about the world we live in as any social documentary."

"District 9 is that modern rarity: an adventure thriller that’s even better than its advertising campaign. For years now, ever since the Alive in Joburg short on which it’s based was released, there has been lots of industry chatter about director Neill Blomkamp’s fantastic premise for an ultra-modern science fiction film; so much so that Peter Jackson of Lord of the Rings fame signed on to produce it in lieu of his adaptation of the Halo videogame.

For months now, its cinema trailer - featuring a huge space ship hovering mysteriously over the South African mega-city while a torrent of anxious newscasters and reporters speculate about its genesis — had had hardened filmgoers, many of them used to mediocre upcoming releases being trumpeted as the holy grail, wowing in unison. For weeks now, its viral marketers, who have festooned bus benches around the country with 'for humans only’ signs, have whetted appetites.

How they’ve been sated! District 9 is the most imaginative, resonant and dramatically turbo-charged work of science fiction for many a moon. A hybrid of political allegory and B-movie kicks, it reboots motifs from classic extra-terrestrial and urban catastrophe movies such as Silent Running and Planet of the Apes, and transposes them to the contemporary ghetto context that in recent years has given urgency and kinetic charge to the likes of Slumdog Millionaire and City of God. Its tacit message to JJ Abrams, director of Cloverfeld and Star Trek, is simple: game on.

Set in present-day Johannesburg, District 9 takes its name from a refugee colony that, for the previous twenty years, has been populated by, goo-gushing, croak- and click-uttering, springy by extra-terrestrial creatures fleeing from their dying planet and disgorged by an enormous spaceship that, for reasons unknown and unprobed, still hangs in the air above their Bantustan.

They’re reviled as bottom-feeders by locals, nicknamed 'prawns’, and fed cans of cat-food. In an opening sequence whose flurry of faux-reportage and breaking news recalls that in last year’s Cloverfield, one long-term resident of the city even claims: “They take my wife away.” An appropriately evil-sounding corporation called Multi-National United is in charge of relocating the prawns to a new camp outside the city. The man entrusted to execute the transfer is Wikus van der Merwe (Sharlto Copley), an affable bureaucrat who’s a cross between The Office’s David Brent and Blakey from On The Buses, and who has been appointed mainly because his father in law (Louis Minnaar) is head of MNU.

Much of the first half of the film takes the form of a travelogue documentary as Wikus journeys into District 9 dishing out eviction notices to prawn shack-dwellers (a quaint touch: real refugees are usually turfed out of their abodes much more peremptorily). He mugs to camera, calls out “I’m a sweetie man” to placate the younger aliens, and, when attacked by irate prawns, yells: “Don’t point your fockin’ tentacles at me!”

Blomfeld and his fellow screenwriter Terri Tatchell depict in fascinating, often funny detail the way the colony has evolved into a ramshackle mix of frontier capitalism, secret technology and pre-modern rituals: among the rutted paths and corrugated shelters, the prawns have not only become addicted to cat food, but attracted the attention of Nigerian gangsters who believe their body parts bring good luck and who have set up shanty-brothels where inter-species prostitution takes place.

One of them though, Christopher (Jason Cope), has managed to horde, reconfigure and hook up banks of gadgets and old computers with which he plans to engineer an aerial exodus for his fellow crustaceans.

He’s rumbled by Wikus, but Wikus is soon in trouble himself: he’s been sprayed with prawn goo and has started to morph into one of them. His mutant DNA makes him hugely coveted by the high-ups at MNU because it allows him to operate devastatingly powerful alien weaponry that normal humans can’t. They plan to harvest his tissue and body parts in the name of R&D: he has to scram.

This is the point at which District 9 itself mutates into a bunch of different films: the gore-splat frenzies of early Peter Jackson movies such as Bad Taste (1987) and Braindead (1992); the bodyshock horror of classic Cronenburg as Wikus, suppurating and disfigured, develops claws which, at one hands-in-front-of-eyes moment of self-mutilation, he tries to chop off; the hi-tech blow outs of Transformers.

Blomfeld surrenders some originality in the course of this transformation, but he handles the chase scenes and machinic mayhem with unusual skill. He’s helped by cinematographer Trent Opaloch and a brilliant special-effects team that renders the prawns as plausibly as any weird creatures that have ever appeared on screen. The sound technicians too, without anthropomorphizing the aliens, make their voices at least if not more attractive than the Afrikaans-speaking military commanders gunning for Wikus.

Sharlto Copley makes the most of the main human role. He’s twitchy and nerdy at first, a preening bureaucrat wedded to an unattractive company. Eventually, he shape-shifts — a human into a prawn, a white-collar pen pusher into a muddy-faced scavenger forced to eat cat food, a geeky representative of a racist system into an ally of dispossessed and maligned outcasts.

His fall from grace is a liberation: it allows him to see through the façade of civil society, the evil of its economics. Becoming an alien and embracing alienation are, the film suggests, key starting points for any political revolution.

In one of the opening scenes of District 9, a reporter, commenting on the spaceship above Johannesburg, likens the situation to a movie. “It’s the kind of thing you’d expect in Manhattan,” she says.

What makes Blomfeld’s film so radical is the clarity and force with which it proves that science fiction can tell us as much about the world we live in as any social documentary. It shows too the wealth of epic, extreme and immensely populist stories that exist to be told about the non-Atlantic world. Who needs Manhattan when there are so many megalopolises and sprawling slum-republics about which brilliant films like District 9 can be be made?"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/filmreviews/6133078/District-9-review.html

300

2007-03-29T13:07:00.000+02:00

The Pentagon goes to Fantasy IslandTue, 27 Mar 2007 18:12:18

By Paul Wilcox:

Just got back from seeing the highly promoted movie “300,” and my only thought is how Pentagon generals must love it to death.

Playing in 2,700 theaters and grossing $70 million the first weekend, the movie is being pushed hard, in the hope that many will see it as a “chill-out” movie after a hard day’s work. The movie is a Pentagon fantasy.

“300” is about the battle at Thermopylae in 480 B.C., where 300 outnumbered Spartan soldiers delayed the Persian army for some time before being wiped out. But this movie has little to do with history and everything to do with war propaganda.

The movie uses all the racist myths that glorify Greek (Spartan) society as defenders of “Western Civilization” and denigrate Persia (current-day Iran) as Eastern and barbaric. In scenes remindful of the racism of Joseph Goebbels, the old Nazi propaganda minister, there are countless references to “endless Asian hordes,” “Persian beasts” and a “new age of freedom.” The Spartans are said to descend from Hercules himself. The severely racist theme of this movie makes it almost unbearable to watch, and has prompted the Iranian government to issue a protest.

I can picture the Pentagon warmakers salivating all over themselves watching this movie. They must so love an army where all the “good guy” Spartan soldiers say, “Yes, my Lord,” to everything the generals order, and whose only ambition is to die in battle. Meanwhile, the bad guys wear monkey-like masks (yes they do in this movie), and generally appear even worse looking than the rhinos, elephants and monsters they use in battle.

Following an old and worn-out U.S. war movie formula that flies in the face of reality, many thousands of the “bad guys” are killed en masse (even in slow motion), then one Spartan is killed and the “good guys” get really mad and swear revenge. To the director, one of them is worth more than many thousands of the “enemy.”

Another offensive stereotype taken out of the garbage can of Hollywood formulas and dusted off is presenting an “evil” person as disabled. The one traitor among the Spartans just happens to be a man with a severely disfigured back and face—who happens to look just like the Persian bad guys.

Pentagon fantasy vs. reality:

In 1968 the song “Ballad of the Green Berets,” glorifying Pentagon death squads in Viet Nam, hit the top of the charts. But 1968 was the year the anti-war movement really blossomed among the population and resistance to the war grew—among the soldiers especially.

It was the year when “credibility gap” became the capitalist media’s byword for the difference between what the government said about the war and what the population thought was true.

Within a few years after that, “fragging” became a well-known term for soldiers tossing fragmentation grenades into their officers’ tents because they were sick of dying in a colonial war.

Does some of this sound familiar?

Bad news for the Pentagon in Iraq? They make up some good news. No weapons of mass destruction? They pretend there are some. Losing a terrible colonial war in Iraq that is becoming ever more unpopular? They make a movie that shows the opposite.

For the Pentagon in 2007, fantasy is so much better than reality.

As the war in Iraq loses popular support, more and more U.S. soldiers are realizing that while they are busy in training pumping iron, the Pentagon is busy on Wall Street pumping oil. U.S. oil companies are making record profits. Soldiers see that they are hated by nearly everyone in Iraq, whatever the Iraqis’ religion or political orientation. The veterans have learned that they won’t get decent medical attention or benefits when they return home, just as with the Vietnam war.

The film “300” will not change the current mood any more than the “Ballad of the Green Berets” did in 1968.

In the end, reality always trumps fantasy, as the Pentagon will find out to its dismay.

Source: www.workers.org

Munich

2006-09-13T23:28:00.000+03:00

A Steven Speilberg film based on the incidents of Black September and Munich operation. It is said that it's Speilberg's call for peace. The movie depicts the consequences of these attacks.

"According to some contrary criticisms of the film there were suggestions that politics are warping critics' interpretations of the film. Some critics have claimed an Israeli bias in the movie, as many others complain of Palestinian bias. The review of the film on BBC World News accused the movie of being too impartial, being too balanced and refusing to take a side to the point where it had no clear message. "**
Quoted from wikipedia.

Nowadays, cultures are crashing and the gap between them is getting wider and wider every second, due to the lack of dialogue, giving space to the others to freely express their opinion will help narrowing this gap. This critical appreciation is intended to answer the question: whether Munich is a biased movie or not, from an Arab point of view. In my point of view I see Munich as an Israeli biased movie. Yet it may be considered the first trial to make an impartial movie representing the Palestinian/Israeli struggle. It may be considered the first movie to succeed in drawing the difference between Zionism and true Judaism.

The movie opens with Munich operation and the media coverage for the incidents- notice how the Israeli media lied several times about the safety of the athletes. Anyhow the Munich operation is considered the secondary story developing with the development of the main story. The whole movie revolves around the character of Avner, played by Eric Bana, an Israeli born office worker for Mossad. He is entitled to lead a squad of five members to assassinate the planners of the Munich operation.

The development of the Munich operation with the development of the main story is one of the many points that prove that this movie is an Israeli biased one. The scenes of the operation come every now and then to remind the audience of the reason the squad is killing for, to win the sympathy of the audience. As I mentioned before, the movie opens with the Munich operation, to set the audience's mind to staying on the Israeli's side. Then as soon as Avner is appointed on the mission, the incidents of the operation are displayed once again to remind us (the audience) of the "noble" cause of this mission. Finally when Avner is tortured by his guilty conscious due to the lots of murders he committed, comes the scene of the Munich operation at its climax. The Munich operation scenes were implemented in the movie to prevent the audience from swaying their mind or to have the least doubt in the righteousness of the squad's mission.

In the movie, the Israelis come with handsome faces, mothers, daughters, lovers, dreams, and even doubts about what they are doing. They take every precaution not to kill civilians, and when they do, they feel so bad about it. And to give the Israelis more humanity, they showed a little girl playing the piano who the Israelis then delayed the murder of her father to save her. Palestinians on the other hand are always portrayed as barbarians and terrorists. The movie stresses on the negative points of the Arabs. The first victim Wael Ze'ita said:" I am not an Arab I'm a Palestinian." He said it in a way as if he was ashamed of being an Arab, shedding light on the Arab's selfishness and nationalism. This point was stressed by Ali's statement when he said:" We want to be nations." The second victim, Mahmoud Hamshari, the head of the PLO was portrayed as a barbarian who can't complete a meeting. This is clear by the interruption of his wife during the alleged interview with Robert, while he should have been presented in a better picture as he is a leader.

The trials of Steven Spielberg to make an unbiased movie are clear in the conflict which some of the Israeli squad agents suffer from, emphasizing the difference between Zionism and Judaism. The conflict with in Avner was not clear from the beginning. He is the kind of guys who hate confusion and stillness as described by Carl. He was brain washed from the very beginning, since his meeting with the Mossad officers. He wasn't given the opportunity to ask question and when he did his questions were ignored. The conflict within him reached its climax when the assassinations came back on him and he was a target. At the end he realized the truth that he was just being used in a very dramatic ending scene.

On the other hand Robert was never the kind cold blooded killer. He was a true Jew. He was presented as a toy maker and has a lot of love to children, which was clear from the look in his eyes to the girl while playing the piano. His conversation at the train station with Avner is considered the wake up call to stop all the killings. He believes that righteousness of the soul can never be achieved by assassinations, clear in when he said: "we are Jews Avner and Jews don't do wrong just because our enemies do." Robert represents the true Judaism. He can clearly grasp the fact that that the blood they shed will come back to them.

The ending scene brilliantly draws the lines of the division among the Jews themselves. It also dramatizes the different views of the Jews concerning living in Israel. Ephraim represents the Zionist point of view that states that any Jew out of Israel or doesn't choose to live there is not a true Jew. While Avner represents the point of view of a moderate true Jew. He chooses to live in peace away of the disturbing life full of assassinations. He realized that he was just a tool in the Mossad's hand when Ephraim declined his invitation to "cut bread with him."

Another brilliant scene is the one when the squad and the Arabs were both setup by Louis to stay in one flat. There are lots of significances behind this scene. The whole scene resembles the situation in Palestine. The flat resembles the land of Palestine. The disagreement on the radio channel clarifies the radical difference in the culture and portrays the struggle between both parties, each one of them wants his culture to prevail. But they finally settled on another culture for a compromise. Even the Jewish and Palestinian inhabitants are personified in the characters of Avner and Ali. The conversation that took place between them is an Israeli biased one. Avner is speaking from the owner of the land point of view, while Ali is speaking as if he is the invader. But reality is the opposite of this case.

Trivia:

There are some points that I wanted to point out that caught my attention.

-The stereotypical representation of Steven Speilberg to both the Jews and the Arabs. He portrayed the Jews in the picture of the avaricious stingy person very accurate in money calculations. When the counselor was explaining for Avner about the operational funds insisted on the word "I want recites." He repeated it many times and his conversation was ended by "Bring me recites." While the Arabs are as usual portrayed as blood thirsty terrorists there wasn't a single Arab through out the whole movie who called for peace.

-In minute 30 in the meeting between Avner and Yvonne Clarifies how Zionists exploit and use the Americans. He mockingly held the American dollar and said:" See James Madison." Just to prove to her that he is working for some rich Americans.

-In minute 1:12 Steven Spielberg humorously mentions Ihud Barak portrayed in the form of a lady.

-At the end in the conversation between Avner and his mother, after all the massacres and assassination he committed. She mention the Holocaust, which comes again as an excuse for all these massacres and again win the sympathy of the audience.

Æon Flux

2006-07-14T02:30:00.000+03:00

Æon Flux is an adaptation for the series "Æon Flux " aired on MTV. Staring Charlize Theron as Æon Flux , Marton Csokas as Trevor Goodchild and Jhonny Lee Miller as Oren Goodchild. It is a scince fiction movie taking place in the future. The whole movie accentuates the life of Æon Flux and her quest for the truth.
"The film is set 400 years in the future, when a virus has wiped out 99 percent of the Earth's population with the survivors inhabiting a walled, protected city-state named Bregna which is ruled by a congress of scientists. The story centers on Æon Flux, the top operative in the underground 'Monican' rebellion led by The Handler. When Æon is sent on a mission to kill a government leader, Trevor Goodchild (Marton Csokas), she uncovers a secret coup and answers about the past and future of Bregna's inhabitants which leads her to doubt her mission."**
quoted from www.wikipedia.org
The movie tackles the controversial scientific discovery, cloaning. People are living like experimental rats. Living in an open prison. And more than that, they find out that they are only copies of themselves, what kind of life is that?! Anyway, for every action there is a reaction. The group of rebelllions called "Monicans" stand up in the face of the dectatorial government of Goodchild. Although their world, Bregna, seems to be a happy one, mistery charges its atmosphere. People disappear and killed at anytime and their cases are always left unsolved.
Can cloaning save the world? Bregna was formed to save the human species. Yet we are meant to die, and only nature is the one who is obsolete not us. We only live once, but with hope. In the case of this movie the scientist responsible for the cloaning process, lives his all his lives ,and I mean his copies too, on the hope of finding his lost love, Katherine, the original copy of Æon Flux. When Æon first met him she felt like she saw him before that she new him in another life.Memories started to flash back in her mind leading her to discover the life she once lived, as Trevor's wife.
Man clings to this life and does what ever he can do to postpone his death, that reached the extreme nowadays by trying to have eternal youth, This was dramatized by Oren Goodchild. as he opposed every chance to stop cloaning. The cloaning process started first to save the human race, but had a fatal complication, sterility. So, scientific researches continued to solve the problem, experimenting on the generations of copies of the original survivors. Yet nature prevailed at the end and the sterility problem was solved without the involvment of the scientist, and since this solution would stop cloaning, Oren Goodchild opposed it and started killing any pregnant woman, and from here started the sieries of mysterious incidents of killing and dissappearing.
As good as the idea and the story of the movie are, the movie was some what boring, The sound effects and visiual effects failed to bring the idea in perfect picture to the viewer. It had a very slow pace at the beggining which made the viewer lose interest in what is happening. The movie reminded me of Jim Cary's "True Man Show" as he also lived as an experiment all his life in an open prison which lead to his state of rebellion at the end, exactly like the imergence of the Monikan rebellious movement. People would think that it is impossible to live in a walled country, an open prison, but unfortunatly if one opens his eyes he will find the paralles to this sad unhuman situation in real life.

A Pause.

2006-07-08T18:11:00.000+03:00

Hello everyone:o)
First of all I would like to thank everyone who spends a minuite of his/her time to even skim over my blog.
It's been a long time not posting. So, I would like to apologize for that. Well one must keep in mind that a writer -a begginer like me- may pass through periods of drought. Ideas are rain drops, falling on a peice of land. Ideas gather in a writer's head like clouds gather in the sky. Condensing on the narrow tip of his pen, clashing with one another till one touches the paper, then a stream of drops follows, nourishing the readers' minds.
I don't want to deviate from the theme of the blog -movies. But as a break I will have a very small deviation, yet somewhat related. Living in a fast busy life one must be focused, and know everthing going around him. The easiest thing to follow what is happening in the world is watching the news. Nowadays, news became a double weapon, manipulating the viewers mental and emotional abilities. In the East where alot of countries live under occupation, the news present alot of bloody scenes, for women, elderly and even children, screaming in pain or agony for the loss of a family member. While the West, where people are nearly living comfortable lives. The news there is less bloody, always concentrating on the good things happening around them.
Eastern news emotionally manipulate the viewers. Charging them with raging emotions, pushing them to rebel to their status quo. While Western news mentally manipulate the viewers. Portraying the world around them as peaceful a good as they can, blocking them from knowing the truth.
Along ages and the case is the western occupation of the east, whether physically or culturaly. The easiest effective weapon nowadays, to fight occupation or support it, is the news. Governing powers on both sides control what messages should be sent to the public, even if it reaches the extent of manipulating the truth.
Subbmission became the dominant feature of the occupied governments. Bashing any hope for resitstance, following orders of "great powers". So, maybe it is the right of eastern news to resist and enlighten the viewers -what else can be done?! May it wake some dead feelings. Are people used to seeing these aweful scenes?!
Yet there are still some free voices in the West to bring the truth to the viewers, but still not in direct messages but in movies like done in "V for Vendetta","Munich", "Crash" and "Syriana". Istarted this blog to point out these messages to help enlighten the readers, but there are not many movies of this genre.
I decided to write about controversial movies like "The Da Vinci Code", but finally found myself writing about other types of movies too, to fulfill the readers' desiers- and i am still in peace with that, what is a writer without readers?! So, comments are always welcomed.

Yacoubian Building

2006-06-27T05:37:00.000+03:00

"Yacoubian Building" is an Egyptian movie worth mentioning. Starring Adel Imam, Yousra, Nour El-Sherif, Hend Sabri, Khaled El-Sawi, Khaled Saleh and the new face Mohamed Imam. Directed by the first-timer, Marwan Hamed. The movie tackles many controversial themes like homosexuality, terrorism and adultery. Accentuating the life of different classes in Egypt and showing the interaction between them. The movie is based on Alaa El-Aswani's novel "Yacoubian Building".
People come and go but buildings are always there witnessing history. Yacoubian Building is one of the oldest buildings witnessing the Egyptian history. Built in 1934 by the millionaire Hagob Yacoubian- still standing till this day in Suliman Pasha street- was originally built for the Armenian colony, rich and high class society business men resided in this building, even some very rich Jews lived there. Nowadays, it is reportedly a little down-in-the-dumps.
The movie opens by telling the history of people coming and going to this building, focusing on the lives of the contemporary residents, of different classes of society, from the pasha to the door keeper. Dramatizing the life of the different classes in contemporary Egypt.
Adel Imam plays the role of Zaki Pasha, a womanizer who totally depends on his inheritance. He lives in the family house with his sister Dawlat. Problems start to rise between the two siblings and they turn against each other. Dawlat is very greedy and wants to kick her brother from the family house. He is trying to live the "western life style" as he called it. Having an open relationship with Yousra playing the role of Christine a pianist. Yet at the end he falls in love with Hend Sabri, Bosaina, a low standard poor girl, from the roof residents.
Nour El-Sherif plays the role of Haj Azzam, who rose from a shoeshine boy to a successful business man. His character is of great importance. He dramatizes the people who disguise behind religious masks, while their true natures are corrupt. He only rose that fast from low class to high class by drug dealing. His character also shows the risky life of business men who are involved into politics. Accentuating the dirty pressures performed by big governmental figures on successful business men. He also proves to be a non religious person driven by his lust. He gets married at very old age, to only satisfy his sexual desires, so he marries Soad, played by Summaya El-Khashab, a widow working hard to raise her child. He takes advantage of her bad financial situation, separates between he and her only son and forbids her from getting children. His injustice reaches it's climax when he heirs some gangsters to force her to abort the baby. Everything he does is completely against religion.
The controversial life of homosexuals is portrayed by the role of Khaled El-Sawi, playing the role of Hatem Rashid, the editor of "Le Caire" newspaper. The only son of a successful Egyptian lawyer and a French mother. In his childhood he was always seeking the attention of his parents but with no reaction from them, they always told him to go away and be quiet. He found no one at home to play with him except for Edris the servant, who introduced him to the underworld of homosexuals. Hatem never got Edris out of his mind. He was involved in many sexual relations with men. One day, walking in the street, wasted from drinking, he sees Abd-Rabo, a well built poor soldier, Hatem is attracted to him and immediately remembers Edris, He gives him money and invites him to a fancy dinner, then takes him back home with him. Abd-Rabo wakes up in the morning tortured by the guilt of the horrible sin, while Hatem, like a devil, comforts him and convinces him that what they are doing is not wrong at all.
Mohamed Imam, playing the role of Taha El-Shazly, the son of the door keeper, presents the fanatical extremism in religion. He works very hard to rise in the social ladder, yet he fails due to the oppression of higher classes. Although he has all the qualifications to be accepted in the police academy, he is rejected because he is the son of the door keeper. He loses all hope to improve his life and family financially and socially. At college he joins an extremist Islamic group and leads demonstrations against the government. Eventually he is caught by the national security. Presenting the inhuman treatment and torture of the prisoners during investigations in dramatic scenes, exposing the cruel and brutal methods used by the police officers, that has no limits from harsh beating to sexual harassment. His life represents the major causes behind extremism.
Yacoubian Building tackled the causes of many social problems facing Egypt nowadays. The taboo of homosexuality is openly discussed. Stating that silence alone will never put an end to this major problem, facing the whole world not Egypt alone. Money may be the cause the root of all problems facing the lower classes in Egypt. The sick perverts of the higher classes manipulate the bad financial situations of the poor, leading to adultery. The lower classes are obliged to sell their honor to be able to support their families. Even religion is manipulated, it is only a mask which corrupt people hide behind to bring them fame. The other face of religion is represented by the life of a religious oppressed person who shifts to extremism due to the shattering of all his dreams due to injustice. All the dirty work of the government on all levels, in prisons and business world is brought to light. The movie is a wake up call for the government to pay more attention in dealing with the public. Showing that oppression will only lead to the revolt of the oppressed.

The Da Vinci Code

2006-06-04T22:05:00.000+03:00

The Da Vinci Code:

In this treatment I will not mention the controversial facts of the book, nor am I going to mention any of the shocking theories of Dan Brown, the author of "The Da Vinci Code". I will not even talk about whether the facts are historically correct or not, as all of this was covered in many debates and treated several times elsewhere.Instead,my treatment will balance between the movie and the book, and whether the movie was successful in fleshing the book or not.

"The Da Vinci Code" is an adaptation for Dan Brown's best seller novel "The Da Vinci Code". Just like the novel, The movie-in it's first week showing in the movies-is number 49 in the Worldwide Box Office rating chart, the movie made $470,606,000,although it is banned in many countries. The Cannes Festival opened with this wonderful controversial movie. The stars of the movie are as great as the novel and the movie itself. Tom Hanks who played the leading role of Robert Langdon was nominated four times for the Academy Awards, and two times winner. Audrey Tautou winner of best young actress award in the ninth Jeune Comedian de Cinema Festival in 1998 and best new actress in Cezar Awards in 2000.She costarred with Tom Hanks and played the role of Sophie Neveu. Sir Ian Mckellen, who was knighted by the queen in 1990, the winner of several awards like the Oscars and Academy Awards. Both the movie and the novel caused a big buzz worldwide.

Since the movie is an adaptation of a novel, then we must be fair to mention the fact that the novel would be more interesting than the movie, as the movie has limited time-two hours and 20 minuites.Yet the movie can compensate for this limitation by dramatizing the plot with advanced graphics and sound.However, the movie failed in keeping pace with the novel, due to out of hands limitations. The movie was shot in the Louvre Museum in France, the filming of the movie was only permitted at night, as equipments were not permitted during the opening hours, the crew was not permitted to shine light on the Mona Lisa nor blood nor mysterious writings were permitted on the wooden floor of the museum. To be fair these limitations didn't stand in the face of the brilliant director Ron Howard, and by the help of advanced technology he was able to film these scenes in the Pinewood Studios outside London.

Yet the limitation of time had a great effect on delaying the movie from keeping up with the novel. The movie is hard to follow for most of those who didn't read the novel, alot of incidents were not dramatized in the movie. At the Louvre, while Langdon and Sophie were checking the Mona Lisa, this incident didn't go as smooth as it went in the movie In the novel, there was a guard who recognized Sophie, in chapter 30, he tried to reach to the DCPJ through his walkie-talkie while pointing the gun towards Sophie and Langdon, in the moment Sophie grabbed the "Madonna of The Rocks" in front of her, so that he will not be able to shoot her and to obey her as well. May be this scene wasn't included in the movie because of the limitations in the Louvre,as they would never allow a Da Vinci painting to be used like that.

Another incident was when Langdon and Sir Leigh Teabing were explaining to Sophie everything behind, the Grail's story ,in chapter 61,Where Langdon is telling her about all the implied messages in art, like the Da Vinci's paintings, the works of Walt Disney like "Sleeping Beauty" and "The Little Mermaid", Victor Hugo's "Hunchback of Notre Dame". All these works that celebrate and glorify the Holy Grail. This incident Would have clarified more about the Grail to those who didn't read the book. In the movie they only discussed the idea of the Holy Grail through Da Vinci's painting "The Last Supper". There are many other incidents that if mentioned would have made it easier for those who didn't read the novel to follow the movie.

Yet Ron Howard was brilliant in tackling the most sensitive issue in Christianity. In the best scene in the movie, when Langdon and Sir Leigh Teabing were telling Sophie about the Divinity of Jesus, this was dramatized as a heated debate between both of them, to express how sticky and controversial the divinity of Jesus is-it is from the basics of Christianity, that no one should even doubt.

Finally, it's advisable to read the novel first before watching the movie, to enjoy every incident taking place, and have information about the roots of every single point and event. The movie, due to the mentioned limitations, only tackled the main important points in the plot of the novel, that only work on portraying the message and the theme of the novel in the simplest form, which made it hard for those who didn't read the novel to follow. For those who read the novel the movie is of a great success and serves as an excellent summary that will help the readers to live every moment of the novel.

Walk The Line

2006-05-27T17:51:00.000+03:00

Walk the Line, starring Reese Witherspoon and Joaquin Phoenix, is an Academy awards best actress and actor winning film for 2005. It is based on the true life story of Johnny Cash since his childhood till his marriage to June Carter. It is a biopic that attempts to comprehensively tell Johnny Cash’s life story or at least the most historically important years of his life. It depicts his hatred towards his alcoholic father that affected him since his childhood and helped in forming this legend. It also focuses on the time when Johnny cash joined the air force, where he composed his first song “Folsom Prison Blues”. It also deals with the husband-wife relationship. It also dramatises Johhny’s first audition in an extraordinary scene. The movie sheds light on love among the emembers of June Carter’s religious family. It also deals with the love story of Johnny Cash and June Carter, and how it drove Johnny Cash to addiction to forget about his miserable life. It also sheds light on religious ideas like forgiveness and divorce.
“Walk The Line” is a title of a song for Johnny Cash. It is about Cash staying faithful to his wife whereas she is on the road: I find it very, very easy to be true / I find myself alone when each day is through / Yes, I’ll admit that I’m a fool for you / Because you’re mine / I walk the line. Along the whole movie we find a collection of Johnny Cash’s wonderful songs. Every song in the movie represents a period of his life. “Folsom Prison Blues” represents his childhood growing up in a prison, as he grew up with an alcoholic father in the house which led him to shut himself up in his room listening to music.
The movie takes place in Folsom prison in the year 1956, where Johnny was in the back stage staring at an electric saw. From this moment on the action starts to develop in a flash back, and it takes us to the year 1936 to Arkensas, where Johnny Cash spent his miserable childhood starting by the horrific death of his older brother Jack in 1944. Time passed on and he joined the air force and left to Germany. Then he fell in love in 1954, married Vivian and lived with her in Tennassee. There he started his singing career when he recorded his first record . From this point he started touring. He met June Carter and fell in love with her ; he tried about forty times to propose to her in many different ways but she refused. Along the tour he also started his addiction , but with the help of June and her family he regained control on his life. And finally in the year 1968 he married June Carter after she accepted his proposal while they were singing “Jackson”. Then we return back to the present moment in Folsom prison, where the movie ends in a wonderful scene that I will talk about later in details
.Johnny cash lived suffering all his life because of his father, who always blamed him for not being there when his brother had his fatal accident. There was an internal conflict within him: he always felt guilty for his brother’s death. On Thanks Giving day he confronted his father and asked him where he was when Jack had the accident, but as usual his father put him down. He was an out-cast from his family. June Carter, too, was an out-cast but from society, because she was a divorced mother. She suffered a lot from people’s talk, and this may be the reason that in every time Johnny proposed to her she refused . That was also the cause of her internal conflict. Religion played a great role in their lives. Johnny knew every single word in the Holy Gospels and had the talent that helped him to sing them all, just like his mother. While June’s religious family taught her compassion and mercy to help the miserable people, they were the main reason that she helped Johnny when he lost everything. June was a very responsible passionate mother, while Johnny was an addict irresponsible father.
The brilliant ending scene brings us back to reality, to Folsom prison in the year 1956. He was dressed up all in black and he looked like he “was going to a funeral”. He was indeed going to the funeral; he was putting an end to his past life in which he was imprisoned for years. On stage he holds up a cup of yellow dirty water that the prisoners drink; it symbolises the worst that could ever happen in life. He says, “I thank God that I do not have to drink this water that you drink” then throws it away and breaks it into pieces; he is telling them to hold on and wait – salvation will come soon with God’s mercy and forgivness.
I think that the power of love together with the presence of the alcoholic father in Johnny Cash’s life controls the whole development of the action. When Johnny was still a child, he badly wanted to get out of the house where he lived in with the beast – his alcoholic father – ; as soon as he got the opportunity to leave he did and joined the air force, for his house was lacking the loving father-son relationship. When he was married to Vivian, he was motivated by his love to her to work hard to make her happier and more comfortable ; when problems started to increase between them, he again tried as hard as he could to engage himself with the tour. This is also clear when he first saw June Carter and fell in love with her ; he tried proposing to her several times , but on every time his proposal was refused, he shifted to drugs to forget his miserable life. Yet June’s loving family, out of religious beliefs, were trying with all their heart to help Johnny get out of his crisis. They believed that God is merciful and forgiving, so they helped him. At the end Johnny was rewarded by marrying the love of his life, June Carter. She was also rewarded with a good loving husband whom she loved, a reward for her mercy towards him and for helping him when he was an addict. It’s only when both of them started to get closer to God and “walk the line” that they were awarded by what they wanted.
Finally, I see that the movie Walk the Line deserves to be an Academy awards winning movie, as both Reese Witherspoon and Joaquin Phoenix did their best in the movie. They both took vocal courses; and Reese Witherspoon learnt to play the autoharp to dramatise the life of this legend in its most perfect way they can. In addition, James Mangold, the director, successfully tackled chronologically all of Johnny Cash’s life from his childhood till his marriage to June Carter. I admit that I did not know Johnny Cash before watching this movie – which is something I should be ashamed of – as I was never introduced to know such a legend. The movie was successful: I know him now!

V For Vendetta

2006-05-26T19:51:00.000+03:00

The movie "V for Vendetta" starring Nataley Portman as Evey and Hugo Weaving as V,mainly talks about the manipulation of the governments with the media and dramatizing the effect of this manipulated media on the public.it also deals with the major problem facing the world nowadays,the terrorism threat . The movie touches on the theme of vengence,which turns out to become a revolution calling for a socio-political change.

For those who didn't watch the movie:Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow:

"The story is set in the near future, when Britain is ruled by a totalitarian regime called Norsefire. It follows Evey Hammond ,a young woman who, at the start of the film, is rescued from state police by a masked vigilante known as "V".After rescuing her, V takes Evey to a rooftop location to witness his spectacular destruction of the Old Bailey. The regime explains the incident to the public as a planned demolition, but this is shown to be a lie when V takes over the state-run TV station the next day. He broadcasts a message urging the people of Britain to rise up against the oppressive government on November 5, one year from that day, when V will destroy the Houses of Parliament.
Evey, who works at the TV station, helps V to escape. V brings Evey to his lair, where she is told that she must stay in hiding with him for her own safety. She stays for some time, but upon learning that V is killing government officials, she escapes to the home of one of her superiors, Gordon Dietrich However, the state police raid Gordon's home shortly afterwards, and Evey is captured. She is incarcerated and tortured for days, finding solace only in notes left by another prisoner, Valerie. Evey is eventually told that she will be executed unless she reveals V's whereabouts. An exhausted Evey says she would rather die, and, surprisingly, is then released. Evey discovers that she has been in V's lair all along, and that her imprisonment was staged by V. By forcing Evey to experience what he had gone through long ago, V hoped that Evey would understand that our integrity, "the very last inch of us", can be more important than our lives.
Evey initially hates V for what he has done, but comes to realise that having faced her own death, she can now live without fear. She leaves V, promising to return before November 5.
In the meanwhile inspector Finch is collecting evidence to capture V,and frinds out the truth about how Norsefire came to power.An also the truth about V's origin.Fourteen years previously, Britain had suffered from war and terrorism. The ultra-conservative Norsefire party led a reactionary purge to restore order; so-called enemies of the state disappeared during the night. The country was deeply divided over the loss of freedom until a bioterrorist attack occurred, killing about 100,000 people. The fear generated by the attack allowed Norsefire to silence all opposition and win the next election by a landslide. A cure for the virus was discovered soon afterwards. With the silent consent of the people, Norsefire turned Britain into a bigoted totalitarian order, with their leader Adam Sutler as High Chancellor.
However, the viral catastrophe had actually been engineered by Norsefire as a ploy to gain power. The virus had been engineered through deadly experimentation on "social deviants" and political dissidents at Larkhill detention center. V had been one of the prisoners, but instead of being killed by the experiments, he had gained heightened mental and physical abilities. V eventually destroyed the center and escaped, vowing to take revenge on Norsefire's regime.
As November 5 nears, V's various schemes cause chaos in Britain, as the population grows more and more intolerant and subversive towards government authority. On the eve of November 5, V is visited again by Evey, and shows her a train which he has filled with explosives in order to destroy Parliament through an explosion in the abandoned London Underground. He delegates the destruction of Parliament to Evey, believing that the ultimate decision should not come from him. He then leaves to meet Party leader Creedy who, as part of an earlier agreement, has agreed to bring V the Chancellor in exchange for V's surrender. Creedy kills the Chancellor in front of V, but V does not surrender, instead killing Creedy and his men. V, mortally wounded in the fight, returns to Evey. He thanks her, and then dies. His body is placed upon the train with the explosives.
Evey is about to send the train down the track when she is discovered by Inspector Finch. However, Finch, having learned much about the corruption of the Norsefire regime, allows Evey to proceed. Meanwhile, thousands of Londoners, all wearing Guy Fawkes masks, march on Parliament to watch the event. Because Creedy and the Chancellor are dead, the military stands down in the face of a civil rebellion. Parliament is destroyed by the explosion. On a nearby rooftop Evey and Finch watch the scene together and hope for a better tomorrow."***
***Quoted from www.wikipedia.com.

"V for Vendetta" has a very high political tone,tackled from the very begining of the movie.starting by the revolutionary scene dramatizing "Guy Fawkes' Gun Powder Plot". The action developes in the near future London,governed by a totalitarian government that manipulates the media to serve it's own needs,and where corruption is spread everywhere. Curfew hours at night are imposed on the public,and anyone who is found in the streets during these curfew hours is severely punished by the corrupt police forces,which is clear in the scene when the police agents were trying to rape Evey.
The movie is also successful in portraying the effect of the media on the unaware public,who is ignorant about the political matters in the country,as they are only fed by the information given to them by the unsincere media.When V blew up the Old Baily ,the employed annoncers on the news channels stated that it's an act of demolition under the government's responsibility,which is the exact opposite to what happened.When V took over the news station and declared his responsibility for the Old Baily's explosion,there were trials from the police to capture him and they accidently killed one of their agents and failed to capture V.Ofcourse the public didn't see V and don't know him,so to cover up for their failure the employed announcers stated on the national television,that the police was successfull in bringing down the "Terrorist" by putting the picture of the dead police agent.
It also touches on the subject of the origins of the governments.London was under the Norsefire totalitarian government that would do anything to stay in power,which has it's parallels in real life.In the movie The Norsfire rose to power when there was division in the country,so they devised the bio-terrorist attack so that the public would have to turn to their own government to protect them.the same as what Hitler did when the Reichstag building was set on fire on febuary 27th,to propagate anti-communism and gain the public on his side in the elections.Which is also done in Western and Arab countries to keep the public under their control.
The main motivation behind V's actions is vengence for what the government did to him and the unhuman treatment that he was treated in prison,where he and the other prisoners were the experiment rats,on which the government experimented it's biological weapons and tortured them.It's in prison that he developed his character and gained his name "V" ,the latin word for number five,he was prisoner number five.So under all this oppresion he rebelled and destroyed the facility and became this new hero V.He devoted himself to change the socio-political status and bring justice to the oppressed.
While on the other hand Evey is weak because of the involvement of the government in her life since her childhood.Her brother died in the bio-terrorist attack,while her parents were taken from their own house,in front of her eyes by government agents because they protested on the government's reaction towards their investigation in the bio-terrorist attack that caused their child's death.So since then and she's always living in fear,till V emancipated her from these fears by subjecting her to death. Evey's example may represent the case of the whole public living in fear waiting for a saviour like V.
The ending scene were V left for Evey the decission to send the train down the track,and interrupted by agent Finch,after he too is enlightened by the truth about the origin of the government-he was blindly serving ,is a wonderful scene, as V left the decission for her because her cause was purer than his her motivation wasn't like his,vengence,but bringing the truth and justice to the oppressed public.
The treatment of the identities in this movie is brilliant.V is not specified as a certain character but V himself admits that we are all V,oppressed by the totalitarian regime,and refuses to reveal his own identity.He is disguised under the face of Guy Fawkes ,the great revolutionary,to send the message to the people that they are all rebbelions and should wake up and open their eyes to what is happening around them.
The movie's success depends on whether it conveyed it's message or not,did it open the publics' eyes not to blindly trust in the media and start to investigate more to reach the truth.The question now is:Did YOU get the message?Are YOU ready to find the truth?